


After The Funeral

by FlowerFly



Series: From Friends To Lovers [7]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe, Canonical Character Death, Darcyland (Marvel), F/M, Fluff and Angst, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Post-Avengers: Endgame (Movie), References to Depression
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-06
Updated: 2019-05-06
Packaged: 2020-02-27 08:15:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,441
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18735145
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FlowerFly/pseuds/FlowerFly
Summary: Darcy and Pepper after THE funeral. Mature for the language.





	After The Funeral

**Author's Note:**

> There weren't any post-Endgame IronTaser fics, so I had to write one even though I haven't watched the film yet. My story is AU anyway.

Darcy threw her ridiculously expensive designer hat somewhere behind the sofa. Her new jacket got to go too. And the handmade sunglasses full of tech, which Tony had given her. They had been useful with hiding her burning eyes in the funeral. 

She was at home now (home would never feel the same) and she didn't have to play the role of a mellow mourning widow. She wasn't mourning, but she knew the sadness would come later. She felt so angry she wished she could hulk out and smash a hole to the floor. 

She looked at the wall of liquids Tony had in the penthouse and took his favorite bottle of whiskey. She wanted to drink all of it and so much more so she would be drunker than at their wedding. But this time he wouldn't be here to take care of her. And she had one very good reason not to drink, too. 

She threw the bottle to the window wall. "Fuck you!" The bottle broke against the alien-proof glass. 

She took other bottles and let them fly too. "Fuck! Fuckfuckfuckfuck! Fuck you Tony Stark! Fuck you for leaving me!"

Somehow she was sobbing on her knees on the floor. The floor was wet from the broken bottles, or maybe it was her tears. There had to be small pieces of glass everywhere but she didn't care. 

She was so _alone_. 

"Ms. Potts is downstairs. Do I allow her to come in", a cheery voice of Friday the AI announced. 

Darcy tempted to say "no" and feel sorry for herself alone, but she said "yes" anyway. You just didn't say no to Pepper Potts, right? Besides Pepper had master admin rights for the tower. She could just walk in if she wanted to. 

Darcy didn't bother to rise from the floor. On the contrary, she lied down. She was Mrs. Stark, no, _The Stark Widow,_ she could do anything she wanted. 

Pepper looked as impeccable as in the funeral. She didn't seem to notice the mess at all (Darcy knew she noticed every bit of it) but focused totally on Darcy who was doing a snow angel on the glass pieces. 

She kneeled next to her. "I came to see how you're doing."

"I'm feeling excellent." C'mon, what could you say to that? "How about you?"

She didn't say anything but took her hand. Darcy lifted her upper body with her other hand and looked at her. She could as well tell her.

"I knew all the details of what happened in Wakanda. There had to have been some other way!" Darcy didn't know what but there had to be. "He chose to sacrifice himself He chose to die!" She knew it was a stupid thing to say, and she was angry just because it was more tolerable than being sad which meant at some level really letting go. She sobbed in Pepper's tight hold for a long time. When she had calmed a bit, the older one asked:

"Did that surprise you?"

"What?" Darcy turned to look at her.

"His suicidal tendencies?"

"What do you mean? Do you _believe_ he wanted to die?"

Pepper caressed Darcy's hair. "I don't know. It wouldn't have been the first time."

Darcy looked horrified. "What do you mean?" She said again louder, hurt, accusingly. 

"Do you remember Ironman flying to the wormhole with a nuclear missile? You must have seen it on TV." 

Darcy swallowed. Of course, she knew about it. She just had never thought of it _that_ way.

"But he had to save the world!"

"Yeah, he might have seen it that way this time, too", Pepper said empathically, but Darcy was very good at seeing behind social masks. And a very unpleasant thought had squirmed in Darcy's mind. 

"What did you just decide not telling me?" She demanded almost climbing on the older woman's lap. 

"How do you think his mental health was when he was with you?"

"Fine, I guess… most of the time", Darcy wondered. "He had post-traumatic nightmares, though." Pepper nodded like _Yeah I know_.

"But not depression?"

"No… not really. Or maybe sometimes. Sometimes he went to some kind of self-depriving state of mind at night if he woke in the middle of the nightmare, but…" She faded out. 

"But what?"

Darcy knew she shouldn't say anything but keeping her mouth shut was not one of her special skills. Especially under Pepper's firmly questioning eyes. "I thought it was because… because of you… that he hated himself because you hadn't loved him as he was." Darcy was totally red on her face (and not just for crying) and she wished she would fall into a wormhole, but, of course, she continued: " That he felt he needed to be better because of you and he was angry at himself because he didn't fill your standards", she ended with _please don't kill me for blaming you_ face. "I'm sorry, I know it was stupid to blame you", she added.

Pepper just lifted her eyebrow and the side of her mouth. "I'm glad he was better." She tilted her head and smiled at her. "And I thought right away that you did really good to him."

Darcy wasn't obfuscated by praises. "And how he was when he was with you?" And she almost didn't dare to ask but asked anyway: "What did you mean with _his suicidal tendencies_?"

"Do you really wanna know?"

"Yes!"

"Even if it would change the way you remember him and think of him?"

"I wanna know the truth." She had sought validation for the belief he made a suicide, she wasn't going to turn back now. 

"Okay", Pepper looked Darcy with her _the bomb is coming_ gaze. "As far as I know, Tony Stark has always had suicidal tendencies." Darcy listened to her eyes dark and wide. "When I started to work with him, he drove like crazy and often drunk. He was a good driver and joked about it, but I saw a lot of self-hatred behind the macho babble. I was always worried about him." Pepper had a small break and just breathed slowly for a moment. Darcy saw tears on her eyes. "After Afghanistan, I thought he would have started to value his life more, but it all had just deteriorated his mental health. He had palladium poisoning which enhanced all his moods and post-traumatic stress, which made him decline to sleep. He drank a lot and often said he didn't deserve to live because Yinsen had died for him. That he should have survived instead of him because he would have been a better man." Pepper cried openly now. Went to find her a tissue, but of course, the perfect woman had found one from some invisible pocket. She continued: "Tony tried suicide with sleeping pills twice. Of course, he pretended they were accidents when JARVIS and I and Happy saved him." Pepper looked at Darcy. "Or maybe they were. I wanted to believe him, but I couldn't. I tried everything I could to get him to receive help, but he didn't trust anyone and declined." 

Darcy held Pepper's hand. "I believe you did your best."

"He wasn't accepted to the Avengers because of his mental instability. After that, he urged a terrorist group for attacking our home. When I was kidnapped and injected with Extremis, his behavior changed a bit. It was like he wanted to stay alive to protect me. But he did very dangerous things with the Avengers."

Now Darcy was holding Pepper in her arms on the wet floor. 

"Things went better when Bruce moved in with us. Tony talked to him, even though he always told him he wasn't _that kind of_ doctor. But it helped anyway." Pepper smiled a bit. "And the rest is the history you know about. Bruce left, Tony and I broke up and so on…." 

Darcy smiled sadly behind her tears. "Thank you for telling me." 

"Thank you for listening. It was good to get it out of." The productive CEO looked around. Dumm-e was cleaning the floor as silently as a robot from the nineties could. Pepper smiled fondly. "At least he knows what he's doing, he's done that many times before." 

They stood up. Darcy didn't want her to leave and held her hands. "Could you stay for the night?"

"Sure." She didn't want to leave the new widow alone. "Have you eaten anything today? We could order something in."

"Let's have Tony's favorite pizza: double pepperoni. And by the way, there's a box of your old clothes in the closet."

Pepper headed for the shower.

**Author's Note:**

> How they spend their night together in Tony's (and Darcy's) bed? There may be smut ahead.


End file.
